An Alternative Guide to New York City

An
Alternative Guide to New York City

As the
premier world metropolis, New York City’s allure is impossible to
sum up with novel hyperbole. Countless films and songs make the
effort but alas, only a personal visit to this oh so cosmopolitan
capital will do.

While
neophytes swoon under the glow of Times Square and loom of landmark
skyscrapers from Empire State to Chrysler, New York, above all else,
is a city of neighbourhoods. Manhattan enclaves like Harlem,
Greenwich Village, Hell’s Kitchen, TriBeCa, SoHo and the Lower East
Side embody the Big Apple’s burly heart and provide the proverbial
marrow for tourists to feast on.

With
that sentiment firmly in mind, here are five New York City
alternatives to consider.

Cross
the Brooklyn Bridge

The
Big Apple borough of Brooklyn is supreme. While mainstream tourists
tend to focus solely on Manhattan, those in the know either stay in
Brooklyn or hop on the subway to enjoy some of the best restaurants,
nightlife and architecture in New York.

With
more than 2.5 million people and 80 distinct neighbourhoods, Brooklyn
is a huge, diverse city unto itself. While the borough’s recent
hipster overhaul and resurgence is a popular media story gone viral,
Brooklyn never had a scarcity of charm. Good P.R. is good for
business however and indeed, hot neighbourhoods like DUMBO,
Williamsburg, Park Slope and Prospect Heights now swell with some of
the most avant-garde and trendy restaurants, cafés and bars in New
York. For vibrant ethnic enclaves and meaty points of interest like
Prospect Park, the Brooklyn Museum and Brooklyn Academy of Music, the
borough should be high on your radar.

Venerable
Vendors

Let
others lament the high cost of a good meal in Manhattan while you
venture on a wildly affordable and delicious street food tour of the
city. The annual Vendy Awards underscore borough gems like the Dosa
Man in Washington Square Park, Jamaican Dutchy on 51st
Street and 7th
in Midtown and King of Falafel on 30th
Street and Broadway. Some of the best gourmet grub on wheels moves
from one ‘hood to another however, so consult Twitter for updates
on where to find the Big Gay Ice Cream Truck, Waffles of Thomas
DeGeest and Rickshaw Dumplings of Kenny Lao.

The
Other Chinatown

Manhattan’s
Chinatown is so yesterday. For a real taste of authentic Hunan,
Fujian and even Dongbei cuisine, head to Flushing, Queens. The host
of the 1964 World’s Fair, annual U.S. Open tennis tournament and
New York Mets baseball team is the new nexus of Chinese culture in
New York City. Almost half of Flushing’s population is from Asia,
with half in turn from China. For remarkable dim sum and full-scale
cultural immersion, take subway line 7 and exit west at Flushing-Main
Street terminus.

Head
Off Broadway

The
Great White Way Theatre District of Midtown Manhattan generates
almost $1 billion worth of tickets every year. Big name productions
with big names stars lure countless tourists to queue up for hours at
the TKTS booth in Times Square to score same-day seats. If you prefer
to make better use of your precious time in the city, head Off
Broadway for the best bang-for-your-buck entertainment in New York.
Apply the same counsel in your quest to score Manhattan
hotel deals as
well.

Second-Tier
Museums

While
folly to dismiss the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, MoMA, Metropolitan
Museum of Art, American Museum of Natural History and Rose Center for
Earth and Space – a nonpareil ensemble to be sure – New York has
a superb second-tier of museums to discover.

The
Frick Collection, for one, is a premier small art museum with notable
works by El Greco, Goya, Rembrandt and Titian, to name just several.
The Whitney Museum of American Art has a permanent collection with
over 18,000 works and brand new digs courtesy of Pritzker Prize
architect Renzo Piano. The Studio Museum in Harlem is diminutive by
comparison but elegantly chronicles the vast creative output of a
diverse African-American community. Last but not least, the
Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum is a foremost chapter of a
little outfit know as the Smithsonian Institution.

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